


reciprocity

by asterismal (asterisms)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Not A Happy Ending, Unhealthy Relationships, but also not sad??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:01:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23392165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asterisms/pseuds/asterismal
Summary: Sixteen years ago, Peter Pettigrew sold Harry’s parents out to Lord Voldemort.Sixteen years ago, Peter Pettigrew stepped over Lily Potter’s still-warm body and stole her baby from his crib.
Relationships: Harry Potter/Voldemort
Comments: 18
Kudos: 438
Collections: Corona Challenge





	reciprocity

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [Tabala](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tabala/pseuds/Tabala) in the [CoronaChallenge](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/CoronaChallenge) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
> Peter Pettigrew doesn't fake his death when he frames Sirius, instead he captures Sirius. Since Sirius was in Azkaban and Remus is a werewolf the next person listed in the Potters will to raise Harry is Peter, and since he is the hero that captured the 'death eater Sirius Black' he is able to gain custody of Harry against Dumbledore's wishes of sending him to Petunia. So Harry is raised by loyal death eater Peter Pettigrew to become a loyal follower as well. 
> 
> Must be consensual.
> 
> So it doesn't perfectly fill the prompt, but I had fun and I hope you enjoy it anyway!!
> 
> Warning: Harry is pretty heavily impacted by his childhood with Peter, and it affects his relationship with Voldemort. I don't think anything in this fic goes beyond what I tagged for, but let me know if you want a more detailed warning or if you think I should add a tag

Harry knows it’s wrong. 

He thinks he’s known it for years, but he doesn’t know how to fix it. Or maybe he does. 

Maybe he just doesn’t want to.

Maybe _he’s_ wrong, too. If he is… Well. He was made this way, wasn’t he? It isn’t his fault.

Or maybe it is. 

Maybe it doesn’t matter. 

Sixteen years ago, Peter Pettigrew sold Harry’s parents out to Lord Voldemort. 

Sixteen years ago, Peter Pettigrew stepped over Lily Potter’s still-warm body and stole her baby from his crib. 

Now, seventeen years old and too tired to feel angry any longer, Harry stands at his Lord’s side, staring out over the lush grounds of the Dark Lord’s current haunt. He doesn’t know how long he’s been standing here, or when his Lord came to join him. He doesn’t know what his Lord is thinking, but he thinks he can guess.

“Dumbledore is dying,” Harry says, breaking the silence between them. 

His Lord’s eyes narrow, but he doesn’t turn from the view. “Are you certain?” 

Harry recalls his latest… conversation with Snape. For all that the man has only ever treated Harry with disdain, flipping between sneering contempt and blistering hatred depending on the day, he’s never lied to him. 

Failed to tell the entire truth, yes. 

But lying directly to his face? 

Never. 

Harry thinks he might be the only person alive who can make that claim. He has no reason to doubt it now.

He says, “I am.”

His Lord doesn’t ask him how he knows. Harry thinks anyone else would be proud to be so trusted. He wonders what it says about him that he can’t be bothered. 

Peter would be upset with him if Harry ever confessed this strange apathy, but Peter will never know. Just as he’ll never know—“Will you be staying?” his Lord asks, and anyone else might think he doesn’t care about the answer Harry is about give.

Harry knows better.

And yet.

“No.” The sun is setting; Peter will be waiting for him. “I should go.”

The man used to be so unconcerned with Harry’s safety. Then the Dark Lord returned—in a ritual Harry still doesn’t like to think about for all that it’s been years because all he remembers is _pain—_ and Peter changed. 

A lot of things changed. 

He has a home to go back to, now. He has a place to keep his books and a desk where he can study. Before, he learned only what lessons he could squeeze out of the local wixen before Peter took him away again. For all that Harry used to find their travels so exciting, there’s something comforting about their little house, where he has a bed and a room and there’s always food in the pantry. 

In the eyes of the Ministry, he’s an adult. He can take care of himself. 

But sometimes he feels so unsteady, so unsafe. 

The house helps.

He’s tried to explain it to his Lord, but—

“I have opened my halls to you, again and again,” his Lord says, and Harry holds himself still at the anger, the disappointment, in his voice. His Lord turns to face him, reaches out to touch one hand to Harry’s cheek. “And still, you deny me.”

Harry closes his eyes, leaning into his hand. “Peter—”

“Peter,” his Lord echoes, his voice dangerously soft. He traces his thumb over Harry’s bottom lip, and Harry opens his eyes to meet his Lord’s gaze. He sneers. “How lucky he is, to have such a dutiful son.” 

Harry knows he’s made a mistake, but he doesn’t know what it was.

He licks his lips, nervous, and when his tongue touches his Lord’s thumb, his gaze drops to Harry’s lips. 

Harry clears his throat. 

“He raised me,” Harry says through a familiar, uncomfortable need to explain himself. He feels it often, as he is often trapped beneath his Lord’s gaze. “He kept me safe. I want to repay that, if I can.”

His Lord hums in thought. 

“Tell me, Harry,” his Lord says, his gaze still lingering on Harry’s lips. Harry can’t fight the way his cheeks heat at the attention. “How old are you?

The question is surprising enough that he flinches, though he doesn’t get far before his Lord’s grip on his jaw tightens, holding him in place. Swallowing heavily, he says, “Seventeen, My Lord.” 

“Yes, I thought so.” 

When his Lord says nothing more, Harry dares to ask, “Why?” 

For a long moment, he doesn’t answer. Then, he asks, “Have I ever told you of my own father?”

His Lord often speaks of his past, but only selectively. He speaks of his trials at Hogwarts, of his travels after and his accomplishments. He’s never spoken of his family. Just the thought of this new information makes it difficult to speak, but he does because he wants to _know._

Harry says, breathless, “You haven’t.” 

“Hmm.” His Lord releases his hold on Harry’s face, folding his hands behind his back as he turns back to the window. His expression grows cold. “Shortly before my birth, he abandoned my mother, and she died in childbirth.”

Harry can’t help his gasp. “Oh.” 

He flushes at his slip in control, clamping his mouth shut. He doesn’t know what he expected, but it wasn’t this. 

Thankfully, his Lord only seems amused at his interruption. He continues, his voice less clipped, his tone less cold. “When I was sixteen, I found him. He was wealthy; he could have taken me in.” Harry wonders if he’s mistaken, or if he hears a note of wistfulness in his Lord’s voice. “But he didn’t, and I killed him.”

Harry’s eyes widen. 

While he can’t say he’s surprised, he _is_ confused. He’s happy to know more about his Lord, but he doesn’t understand why he’s been told. 

“Did it help?” Harry asks, and he doesn’t realize until the words are already out that he’s desperate for the answer. 

His Lord grins, looking viciously satisfied. “It did.”

Harry looks away.

“If I—” He cuts himself off, refusing to say the words. 

His Lord takes hold of his chin again, forcing him to raise his head, to look him in the eye. “You are conflicted, Harry.”

Harry doesn’t flinch away, though he wants to. “Am I?” he asks. 

“You hate him,” his Lord tells him, and for a moment he looks almost hungry. “He’s hurt you.”

“So have you.” 

His Lord’s eyes narrow, but he looks less angry and more… curious. “Do you hate me, Harry?”

Harry doesn’t bother lying. “I don’t know.”

“As I said.” His Lord seems almost disappointed. “You are conflicted.” 

The question stays with him. 

Does he hate his Lord? It’s not something he thinks about often. In fact, he tries not to think about it at all. He’s always been good at that. 

He rolls over on his stomach and pulls his pillow over his head, pressing his face into the mattress. He wants to shout.

He wants to break something, but Peter would hear it if he did. 

So he only lies there. 

Peter used to tell him stories, when he couldn’t sleep at night. Some of them were lies, he knows now. But some of them were true. 

Lord Voldemort killed his parents, and Peter told him where to find them.

Peter never hit him, but he _did_ hurt him, and Harry has always known that there was a part of the man that enjoyed it. Peter never gave him any scars, but he never helped to heal the ones Harry earned by himself, whether by mistake or… 

He never stopped it. 

But for the first fourteen years of his life, Peter was the only constant he knew, and sometimes he was kind. 

He used to sing, when he thought Harry was asleep. He’d sit beside Harry, on the ground or some cheap, borrowed bed, and he’d touch his hand to Harry’s brow, and he’d _sing._

He was never a very good singer, but it didn’t matter.

It helped.

And then he was fourteen, and he thought he was dying, because he went to sleep one night and when he woke up, he was on fire. 

(Once, when he was eleven, Peter held him under the Cruciatus Curse. He said it was important to know what it was like, and Harry never forgot how it felt. 

This was worse.) 

And then it was over, and the Dark Lord he’d heard so many stories about—mostly from Peter, but not always—was back. 

And everything changed. 

Does he hate the Dark Lord? He thinks he should.

And Peter?

He remembers being angry, once, so angry he thought he could kill someone, could ruin everything, and he wouldn’t even be sorry. They were hiding in some village near the coast of France—lying low while they lost Dumbledore’s spy, who he only later learned was one Severus Snape, and wasn’t _that_ fun—and the baker’s English cousin had come to visit. 

It was in that village, tucked carefully out of sight as he listened to the baker's cousin tell his story, that Harry first learned Peter was a liar. 

He doesn’t remember what the wizard said, what he must have overheard, but he remembers the way he'd stormed back to his and Peter’s camp, dripping fire from his clenched fists. It was the first time he shouted at Peter.

He’d almost burned the whole forest down. 

“I’ll tell,” he’d said, half-hysterical. He thinks he must have been crying. “I’ll find Dumbledore’s spy, and I’ll tell him _everything.”_

Peter had only laughed at him. “Go ahead, Harry,” he’d said. “Find him. Tell him how I killed those muggles, the night I took you. How I’ve killed more since. How I stole and lied and tried to bring the Dark Lord back.”

Harry had been trembling, he remembers.

“But make sure you tell him this, too.” Peter had smiled, then, frightening and _mean._ “You _helped_.”

And he had helped. He’d helped, because he hadn’t known better. And when he did know better, he didn’t know what else to do.

He never goes to find Dumbledore’s spy—not then, not any time after.

Now, as the memory burns through him, he thinks he _does_ hate Peter, just as he did then. 

Because Peter took him, and he made him into what he is now. He twisted something up inside him, and Harry doesn’t know how to put it back.

He knows, of course, how his Lord would fix it. But he hates his Lord too, doesn’t he?

He denies his Lord three more times. Each time, he thinks of Peter, alone in their little house. 

In the years before his Lord’s return, Peter was so sure of his place, of his power. He used to sit Harry at his feet and tell him of all the things he’d do when he had the Dark Lord’s favor. He’d been so certain it was coming.

And for a while, he had it.

Harry isn’t certain _why_ he lost it, but he can guess. 

He doesn’t remember the exact moment the way his Lord looks at him changed, how his gaze weighed heavier and his touch lingered longer, but he remembers the first time he noticed. And he remembers the way Peter had paled and snatched his hand away from Harry’s shoulder when his Lord came to their house one day, entering without warning. 

He remembers the gleam in his Lord’s eyes. _Envy_ , he’d thought, and then he’d scrubbed the thought from his mind because it made him nervous. 

Peter is always nervous, now. 

If he were just a little bit crueler, Harry thinks he’d enjoy it. But he doesn’t. 

He can’t. 

And then his Lord’s patience runs out.

His most recent visit to the Dark Lord’s manor is unplanned. He has no business to report, no advice to seek. He visits because he enjoys his Lord’s company, and he wants more of it.

Nagini finds him in the library, where he’s decided to wait upon seeing the door to his Lord’s study is closed. 

_“Hello, speaker,”_ she greets him, climbing his chair to settle across his body. He sets his book aside, obligingly scratching at her scales. _“Why are you here?”_

Always so blunt, Harry thinks fondly. 

_“I came to see our Lord,”_ he explains. 

This is another secret he’s kept from Peter, first because he thought all wixen could speak to snakes, then because he wanted something solely his own, and this secret was all he had. 

_“He is busy.”_

_“I know.”_ Harry grins. _“That’s why I’m waiting here.”_

Nagini hisses in approval. _“Good speaker,”_ she praises him. _“Much more polite than your sire.”_

Harry had tried, once, to explain that Peter was not actually his father, but she hadn’t understood. He hasn’t tried since. 

Only, now that he’s thinking about Peter, he’s certain the man hasn’t been called since before the Dark Lord moved into his newest manor. Harry used to be the first to know when he was called, so why…

 _“Peter?”_ he asks. _“Is he here?”_

 _“In my Master’s study,”_ Nagini tells him. _“He always cries so loud. Perhaps I will eat him, this time.”_

“What!” He shifts her coils from his lap, ignoring her annoyed hiss.

He makes his way back to his Lord’s study with his heart in his throat. As usual, the door opens easily under his touch, though he’s certain it was locked. 

Frozen in the doorway, he takes in the scene before him.

Peter is on his knees by the window, with his forehead almost touching the floor and tear tracks on his face. Harry’s heart clenches at the sight, but he can’t move. Stood before him is the Dark Lord, his entire form dripping malice as his magic lashes through the air, barely controlled. 

Peter sobs, and Harry takes a stumbling, startled step forward.

His Lord snaps his head up to glare his way, only to falter when he sees who’s interrupted them. “Harry—”

“What are you doing?” Harry demands, interrupting whatever explanation he was about to give. He strides toward Peter, dropping to his knees at his side. “What’s going on?”

Peter looks up at him, only to cringe away when he meets Harry’s eyes. 

So Harry looks back to his Lord, glaring.

And his Lord hesitates. 

Finally, his voice devoid of all emotion, he says, “Wormtail has outlived his usefulness.”

Wormtail. 

_Wormtail._

Harry remembers the stories Peter used to tell him about his father. Like his stories about Lord Voldemort, only some were true. But even in the lies, he saw enough of the truth to know how Peter hates that name, how he’s hated it for years. 

He should bite his tongue, he thinks.

He should lower his gaze and accept his Lord’s judgement. 

But he can’t. He remembers that day in the woods. He could have burned the entire forest to ash, but he didn't.

He could have gotten away, but he _didn't._

He can speak now, and he will. “Liar,” he accuses, all but spitting the word. 

His Lord’s eyes widen, fury overtaking the freezing calm. “You dare—”

“Yes, I dare,” Harry says. He stands, plants himself in front of Peter. “You’re not doing this because he’s useless.” He stalks forward until he’s toe to toe with his Lord. “You’re _jealous—_ ”

His Lord snarls. 

Harry presses on. He leans forward, jabbing at his Lord’s chest with one finger. He can't stop. “—Because I keep going back to him, even though you think you have something better to offer. Because even with all your power, you just _hate_ that you aren't the most important person in my life, don’t you?” 

His Lord snatches Harry’s wrist, squeezing. “You foolish boy, I am trying to protect you—”

“Protect me?” Harry tries to wrench free, but he can’t. And he hates it. “If I need protection from anyone, it’s _you.”_

“He’s controlling you—”

“Oh, and I should let you control me instead?” 

“Yes!” his Lord says, all but shouting. In the silence that follows, Harry realizes he’s trembling. His Lord blinks in shock. “I only meant—”

Harry lashes out as he never has before, shoving his Lord away from him. He goes, releasing his hold on Harry’s wrist. 

“I know what you meant,” Harry tells him. 

The next time he speaks, his Lord’s voice is soft, entreating. “He _hurt_ you, Harry.”

The words are familiar. 

“So did you.” Before his Lord can continue the script, Harry draws himself up to his full height and lifts his chin. “You murdered my parents. You _took them_ from me.” His Lord doesn’t try to speak again. Good, he thinks viciously, he can learn. “And now you’re trying to do it again.”

For a moment longer, his only Lord watches him, as if to make sure he’s finished. 

But before his Lord can say anything, and Harry is _certain_ he has more to say, he feels Peter grasp one of his hands and whirls to face the kneeling man. Peter holds tighter. “Thank you,” Peter says, gasping, trembling. “Thank you, Harry.”

And Harry feels… sick. 

“Shut up,” he snaps. Peter flinches back, looking up at him with wide, watery eyes. Harry pulls his hand free and steps back, until he can face both Peter and his Lord at once. His Lord opens his mouth. “ _Both_ of you.”

His Lord tries again. “Harry—”

“Shut _up!”_

All the glass in the room shatters. 

Peter cringes on the floor, covering his face. But his Lord… His Lord only stands there, his eyes gleaming with something like pleasure at Harry's display, as if he's finally been given a gift he's waited years for. There’s a line of red down his cheek, welling up with crimson. It matches his eyes.

Harry tears his gaze away. He closes his eyes, forcing his breaths even again. 

The desk stops rattling.

His Lord must move closer, then, because he feels his hands on his face, caressing him. “Magnificent,” his Lord says, reverent. 

Harry lets out a strangled noise of protest, unwilling to speak but equally unwilling to accept his Lord’s praise. His Lord ignores him, leaning down until he can brush a kiss to Harry’s brow.

This time, Peter protests, only to be cut off with a squeak.

Harry opens his eyes and tilts his head to see beyond his Lord’s shoulder. Peter’s mouth is bound shut. 

He sighs. He’s so _tired_ _._ “Don’t hurt him,” he says quietly. 

His Lord scoffs, but the binding over Peter’s mouth falls away. “He deserves it,” his Lord says.

Harry sways forward, presses his face into his Lord’s chest. “So do you.”

Instead of arguing with him, his Lord only pulls him closer, holding him in his arms. Harry doesn’t fight it, because he doesn’t want to.

“Stay with me,” his Lord says into his hair.

Harry shudders in his arms, but he doesn’t pull away. He says, “Let Peter go.”

With a put-upon sigh, his Lord draws away, just enough that he can look Harry in the eye before he stoops to press a chaste kiss to his lips. He doesn’t make any promises, but he doesn’t stop Peter when he scrambles to his feet and out the door.

He only kisses Harry again.

And maybe it shouldn’t be enough—and maybe it isn’t—but Harry doesn’t stop him.

He thinks he doesn’t want to.

**Author's Note:**

> I've never done much with Peter Pettigrew before, but as soon as I saw this prompt I wanted to explore his character a little bit. Maybe I'll use him more in the future.


End file.
